A1 Books sells/distributes through Amazon and even though they cannot be easily contacted their phone number is 973-426-9995. I was only able to leave a voicemail regarding an item I ordered. 9 days later I received notice the item was not in stock. I expected it to BE here by now!! They are not available to comment?! I am concerned that if I cancel my order that it will not be refunded, since this company has a bad reputation. Once I reach resolution I will be leaving a review for this seller on Amazon.

Below is a timeline of my order. The issue is getting an e-mail saying that my order has been shipped, then 8 days later getting another e-mail that my order is backordered! That is not good service.  
 
 
5/8/2008 2:44:00 PM: Ordered Radical Brewing with 3-5 business days shipping. Item was in stock at time of order.  
 
5/9/2008 E-mail that seller is being contacted to confirm order. The book was ordered through buy.com  
 
5/11/2008 E-mail that the following items on your Buy.com Marketplace order have shipped! The seller, a1books has confirmed the shipment was sent on Sunday, May 11, 2008. You have selected Standard shipping and should receive  
your item(s) in 4 to 14 business days.  
 
5/19/2008 E-mail from A1 that order has been delayed because they ran out of stock on the item ordered.  
 
6/03/2008 I wrote A1 Books an e-mail through their website (no phone number to call) asking for a free shipping coupon or percent off coupon if I decided to try them out a second time.  
 
6/04/2008 I received an e-mail back from A1 Books stating things about shipped using Standard Ground Shipping.  
Did they even read my e-mail? I'm not complaining about the shipping. The shipping is fine. I'm complaining about the not just misleading e-mails, but the obviously false e-mails that were sent to me stating that an item as has been shipped when it hasn't. And that it took them another 8 days to send me a second e-mail stating that my item is backordered.  
 
 
 
 

I would strongly advise staying away from this company. Customer service is nonexistent - nearly the same reply is given to all requests, and they do not offer telephone contact (that says it all). I ordered my book on the 15th of April from Alibris, and the order was not processed by A1 until the 22nd. It was shipped from New Jersey on the 24th and I still haven't received it, one month later (and I am in New York City!!). They keep giving me the runaround: please wait another 4-7 business days, etc. And they have no way to track your package once it has left the facility. I wish I had read these reviews before I ordered from A1... Stay away from this company!!

I ordered my book used through Barnes & Nobles. I never heard of this company and Barnes & Nobles had them listed with good reviews.  
 
It's been only about two weeks, but I have never had an order delayed this long before. I started getting a bit worried and found all over the internet HORRIBLE reviews. I assumed they would be a good site since Barnes & Nobles had them listed as an "Authorized Reseller."  
 
I've read numerous entries about customers complaining about never receiving their book and this company giving the same excuse of being the carriers (USPS) fault. Others are also complaining about receiving the wrong book and getting charged a restocking fee for their mistake. WTF? It is very obvious a scam is going on here and I may have become a victim of it...  
 
 
Possible evidence of mischief:  
 
I did a little investigation work and re-examined the reviews about them on Barnes & Nobles site. As of this moment they have 21,713 ratings with 4.4/5 score. I compared the amount of ratings to other resellers on B & N's site and most had an average amount of ratings between 500-2000. A little skeptical of this I started looking at the comments on them on B & N's site and saw duplicated posts written in a same format with high ratings. On 4/16 and 4/15 they had about 45-75 reviews each day (A huge amount in comparison to the other resellers). Either they are so busy they can not keep up with their orders or they have a Bot that autofills random comments with high scores... Either way, I, the consumer, should not have to question this...hmm...  
 
- Worried  
 
 
UPDATE (PLEASE READ): I ended up receiving my books on 3/21. I ordered the book used but it looked new! I am very pleased that the book did arrive and was in excellent condition.  
 
If there was mention about it being shipped as media mail, my apologies, I must have missed it. None of my e-receipts state this. My only complaint now is that my order took a little longer than expected to process, which left me worried.

This review was modified by its author, iicriscoii, on 4/23/08 11:36 AM.

A1 books sucks and has horrible business practices. The simple fact that they do not have a customer service phone number says it all. After waiting for over three weeks for my book, they shipped the wrong book. I have to pay for shipping the book back and a restocking fee. I can't believe a company like barnes and noble would use them.

A1book.com who is selling books via Alibris.com ripped me off on: CCNA CISCO CERTIFIED NETWORK ASSOCIATE Study Guide by Todd Lammle.  
 
The book was being advertised as new, it came used. It was missing the most important element which is a CD that serves as a virtual computer lab, and a testing facility.  
 
Without the CD, the book is worthless to me.  
 
This company SUCKS.  
 
Im calling my credit card company for a refund. It beats paying for shipping and only getting half of my money back!

Placed an order with a1books.com through amazon.com. Amazon sent me a confirmation and said no email would be sent from the a1books and thy also stated the item should arrive in 2-4weeks.  
 
An email confirmation was sent from a1books.com the next day confirming my order. Two days later another email arrived saying my order was shipped the previous day. The tracking number received never seemed to work, when trying to check the delivary status. From a week after placing the order the item arrived. For being used it was in very good condition.  
 
Would consider this store to be about average. According to amazon's ratings this store has been doing very well lately regarding orders. Would buy from again.

Same old story. I never received the book that I purchased. Customer service wouldn't help; although they were more than happy to take my money. They said that if the book was mistakenly shipped back to them by the post office, I would even have to pay a restocking fee. Stay away!!! THE WORST!!!

I never received the item I ordered. It was a $20 book that they shipped via USPS mail & they did not use insurance or signature confirmation. They sent me a "delivery confirmation" # that proves that something they shipped was delivered somewhere in my zip code. USPS may have accidentally lost it, but the A1customer service said I had to resolve the issue with USPS. USPS of course said what A1books should have known - delivery confirmation does not guarantee the item was delivered to the correct address - it just means it was delivered someplace. I don't know about you, but I get my neighbors mail from time to time - it happens. Since there is no insurance USPS can't do anything for me. I contacted A1books asking them to send another copy since USPS lost it, and they said they can't do anything for me. They'll save $20 by not sending another copy but they'll loose a customer or two & will see this ugly review forever. In the end they'll lose more.

This review was modified by its author, ddeppe, on 9/29/06 10:12 AM.

I ordered a book from "a1 Books", in January. There was no hesitation on their part to immediately extract the funds from my account through PayPal. I never received my book and tried repeatedly to find out its status. The only contact I received from them was as of late (7 months later!). They were trying to get me to resell through them! That was the ONLY time I was able to contact them with any response (on their part). They sent me a short message, when I was FINALLY able to let them know I never received what I paid for. They said they would 'look into it'; again, no response from them. I THEN reopened their ONLY method of contact; their 'email request box' (their DARK HOLE to their email "wastebasket"), and told them I would like a response. The response I got back from them was that it was now basically MY PROBLEM, as I did not contact them within their supposed 60-day window. I TRIED SEVERAL TIMES; with NO RESPONSE FROM THEM! I just sent the following to them explaining this... ...this is a copy/paste ----  
 
In an answer to your response…  
 
(You must inform us within 60 business days of the date we shipped your item, if you had not got the item.)  
 
Apparently the following statement from myself was overlooked, or ignored.  
 
“…I ordered this book long ago, paid for it and (((NEVER))) received it! I did all I could to get an answer, with NO SUCCESS!  
 
---anyway, "a1 Books" is seemingly getting away with robbery. I am going to contact PayPal. I would not have known what to do if I had not accidentally come across this site. This company is FINANCIALLY SCAMMING many individuals and they are undoubtedly stealing lots of money, as there seems to be no way to shut them down. They get the innocents whom are not savvy to these types of rip-offs.  

I am so incredibly dissatisfied with this retailer. I purchased the Phaidan World Atlas of Contemporary Architecture from them because it is a book that is normally $160, they offered it for $105. I ordered it as a gift for Christmas, and since I ordered it on December 14, I was pretty confident that it would arrive on time. My mistake. It is January 5th, and I have still not received the book. I was forced to buy the book at the standard price from a local bookstore, so now I have paid a total of $265, when I should have just paid $105. I have contacted them by email repeatedly by email (they have no other way listed anywhere - that should have been my first tip-off, but I was naive before), and just get stupid automated responses that do not answer the problem, they just say they have contacted the merchant (I thought they were the merchant?). I asked for a refund, nothing. DO NOT USE THIS BOOKSELLER! They are absolutely horrible! I will contact the Better Business Beureau in hopes of shutting them down. Judging from all of the other posts, my case is not unique.

I went to allbookstores.com to search for a book and came up with a1books.com as the lowest price. I was skeptical at first because I've never heard of the company and resellerratings.com didn't have it listed as one of the store (this new listing of a1books.com is requested by me). I took the chance and bought it on Dec 17, 2003. Within two minutes, I've received a confirmation email about my order so in a way it was some sort of good news. By the end of the month, still no book yet so I went to their website and logged into my account. There wasn't a way to find out if my item had been shipped nor there was a tracking number. So I waited and it arrived on Jan 6, 2004. The confirmation letter that they had sent me did indicated that it takes between 10 to 14 business days for merchandise to arrive. Well, if I don't count weekends and holidays as business days, then my book arrived in 12 days, within 10 to 14 days that they had promised (but doesn't U.S. postal service work on Saturdays?)However, it was sent in a bubble mailer via media mail using mechanical bar codes. There wasn't a sent day stamped so there's no way of telling when it was sent. I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt by hoping it was the holiday season and that they shipped it from New Jersey to my home in Texas. My advice to you is if you need your book right away then try to buy it locally. If you can wait at least a week then a1books can save you some money.